AllFreeNovel
Share Us
John sat on the arm of the sofa, wondering what the fuck he could say. He bit the inside of his cheek, the memory of Stephanie’s bloody corpse at the forefront of his mind.
‘It’s not for you to worry about,’ he said. ‘I can’t talk about it anymore.’
Juliette’s face fell. ‘Okay,’ she said, looking back to the TV. It was clear she was hurt, but she didn’t say anything. She was a good girl. Always had been. Sometimes too good.
‘Sweetie,’ John said, cursing the Gypsy Brothers’ existence as he reached out a hand to his daughter. She looked at it like it was a piece of shit and pulled away, out of his reach.
‘Did you help him kill her?’ Juliette asked suddenly. There it was. Her attitude. He was almost relieved to hear it. It was better than her fear.
‘No,’ he replied. ‘I didn’t help him kill her. I would never hurt a woman. A mother.’
‘But you do hurt people. Don’t you?’ She looked at his messed-up knuckles, and John found himself shoving his hands in his pockets, ashamed.
‘Your Uncle Dornan was out of line,’ John said tightly.
She blinked her big green eyes up at him. ‘It was because Dornan found them, wasn’t it? Jason said he knew–’
John’s expression must have changed, because she stopped mid-sentence. ‘Never mind,’ Juliette said, looking at the floor.
‘You can tell me, Julie,’ John said. He felt sweat gather on the back of his neck. Too many secrets. Too many lies. Don’t shut down on me now, Julie.
‘Jason said he knew you before,’ she said. ‘That you sent them money. Is that why we never have any money?’
John looked around the cramped living room, acutely aware of how well Caroline could hear things, even when she was high. ‘Where’s your mother?’
Juliette shrugged. John looked around again, feeling deeply unsettled. ‘We can talk about this later,’ he said, taking a twenty out of his beat-up wallet and passing it to Juliette. ‘Order pizza if you get hungry. And don’t tell anyone about what you and Jason discussed, okay?’ He lowered his voice to a barely audible level. ‘If your mother hears talk about sending money off, she will lose her goddamn mind. Understand?’
She nodded.
‘Don’t go to his house,’ John added. They both knew who he was referring to.
Juliette frowned. ‘Don’t tell me I can’t see him, Dad,’ she said. ‘If I don’t go see him, he’s all alone.’
He could hardly argue with that. Instead, he kissed the top of her head before shrugging into his leather jacket. The thing seemed to get heavier with time, and it was true, the burden of who he was and who he had to be was a weight he bore alone, a weight he couldn’t bear to hold for another moment but which stayed with him, unrelenting, pressing down on his shoulders with every step he took. He glimpsed himself in the hallway mirror on his way out. He looked worn out, used up. He looked like somebody who should’ve gotten out of this game a long time ago.
Before he could go anywhere, though, he got the phone call from Viper. Club business in San Diego. Dornan had demanded John’s presence immediately. And Caroline’s. And Juliette’s.
Not just club business, though. A celebration. Seemed the woman he would have laid down his life for, the woman he loved more than anything, had been unreachable for two days because she was busy marrying Dornan.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
MARIANA
Dornan’s father lived on a compound that belonged in a Hollywood movie. It was ridiculous: a massive parcel of land, the main part of which was surrounded by a six-foot solid brick fence. A fence topped with razor wire and broken glass. Basically, unless Emilio wanted you to enter or leave, you were fucked.
Which was why it seemed such an odd place to hold a party. Yeah, you could jazz the place up, get out some tables and break out the crystal wine glasses, but at the end of the day the place resembled a prison more than the palatial homestead it was obviously trying to convey. Perhaps I was just biased; I’d started my days as a captive in this very place, locked underground in a tiny cell, stripped and humiliated and prepared for an auction where Emilio had planned to sell me as a slave.
Dornan had been the only reason I hadn’t ended up living in a dog cage at the end of some psychopath’s bed, naked and wearing a chain around my neck. Maybe. Probably.
But now I was one of the familia, welcomed with open arms. It was surreal, like a nightmare that you can’t quite wake up from but that you know is about to give you a heart attack if you stay in it for a moment longer.
After Dornan had finally woken from his drugged slumber around noon, we left Vegas. We’d stopped off in LA briefly on our way back, for showers, extra clothes and Dornan’s motorcycle. I’d voted to stay in the limo, but Dornan rejected that. He hadn’t told me anything about where we’d be going on the motorcycle, other than that we were celebrating our quickie nuptials with his family. Something I was just thrilled about. He also hadn’t seemed suspicious about the way he’d passed out for several hours after drinking the drugged coffee Lindsay had sent up to our hotel room, which was a small mercy.
At Emilio’s compound, four hours later, I had to fight to keep my jaw off the pavement as I surveyed no less than fifty Harley-Davidson motorcycles parked up inside the compound, flanking the long driveway that culminated in a large circle in front of the main house. There were dozens of cars too. I spied John’s, and wondered where he was. How he’d been told about what had happened in Vegas, and by who.
If he thought I’d betrayed him.
A deep sorrow spread through me. My finger was still throbbing. How had it come to this? Marrying a man by force, letting him flaunt our union in front of everyone he knew? In front of the man I actually loved? Lying to everyone, conducting secret meetings with the FBI after allowing them to drug said husband . . . Things were spiralling completely out of control.
